Yeah I was thinking this too. At 39, Buffon is still better than Donnarumma at 18 , Perin at 25 or Scuffet is at 21. Unless he declines and they improve to his level, Italy may as well stay with Buffon. The question is in the next WC cycle, Buffon will be 44 so maybe he can just play through the Euros or until he is 41/42.
Buffon intends to retire from the game overall. The only exception may be if Juve were to win the CL. Then he would hope that he can stay on as a second keeper and get a chance to play in the World Club Championship. But that would be a part-time gig for him. I am not sure why this has become a topic of discussion. Time to move on and start a new cycle.
Has Italy experimented with a 4-3-3? I've noticed they've continued to stick with the 2 striker system. Perhaps something like this would work well: Donnarumma Florenzi-Bonucci-Romagnoli-Santon Verratti-Jorginho-Pellegrini El Shaarawy-Immobile-Insigne
It is just that I don't really trust the other GK's over Buffon. At least not right now. You are right though, LARGO AI GIOVANI!
You are telling me! did you know Emma Morano would have been 118 years old today? Sadly, she passed away last April in Verbania, Italy. She was only 100 years older than Donnarumma! Emma Morano -
Italy is 3rd after the US and Japan on this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_living_people Its rather astonishing considering that Japan and the US have 3x more people.
IMO you play the very best...........regardless whether they are 38 or 18. If Buffon is still our best option and I think he is, then u play him, assuming he still wants to play.
If you include the UEFA Nations League, it will be in September 2018, if you don't it will be the first euro2020 qualifier in March 2019. However, given the impact that every game - including friendlies - have on the ranking, even the next games at the end of March are important. FIGC never really seemed to have grasped the idea of using friendlies to help ensure a lofty ranking.
I still don't get the concept even though I read a little about the NL. From my take the games count but the games are still a year away. That is quite a long time.
Something about top team in each division getting direct access to the Euro's without having to qualify. Don't quote me, I think I read it in here actually. There's the losers tournament this summer. Good time to promote some of the U21 IMO.
I wonder if teams are going to play younger players in this nations league to get them experience and treat these as friendlies or actually try to go out and win the thing. Either way, i think there's promotion and relegation in each division. I can't imagine Italy wants to be relegated in this thing regardless of how serious they take it lol
Someone needs to do a bit of digging into the Fifa algorithm. I know it's better than it was 12 years ago, and on paper their explanation makes sense, but some of the teams ranked and looking at their records don't add up to my mind initially. I can't be bothered to try and figure it out. Apparently some Croatian mathematician (read it in here...can't remember who) figured out what sorts of results were necessary during friendlies to improve rankings. Regardless of circumventing the calculations, I think that friendlies should absolutely not go towards rankings and seedings, otherwise you lose out on an important experimental aspect of them if you're forced to go for results so you don't get tougher qualifying groups, or first round groups in tournaments. I believe friendlies should be used for a coach to experiment. That's what they are there for.
You're taking these all-star event sideshows much too seriously. I have no idea how they choose which guys participate in the slam dunk contest at the NBA All-star game either.
The system is stupid but it probably won't change. Europe might be the only confederation where it matters given the amount of teams. But they should stop calling them "friendlies" in Italy so the message will get through that they're NOT technically friendlies! Any playoff is a 50-50 match with the spread in quality and this disaster could easily happen again without that pot 1 seeding.